Niv-Mizzet is an efficient combo deck that does not rely on dedicated combo pieces to win, but instead wins through powerful spells that are never dead draws at all stages of the game, all while Niv-Mizzet watches from atop his fiery throne.
Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind has developed a long-standing reputation of being a dangerous commander that must be killed on sight as there are many cards that form a two card combo with him. However these combos, while easy to perform are very vulnerable to any type of removal and the combo pieces themselves are dead cards outside of their combo. Because of this, I have chosen to run
Curiosity
as the only card that goes infinite with Niv himself. And even that is the one of the worst cards in the deck as I rarely cast Niv due to the hate he draws. The goal of the deck is to run as few dead cards as possible and have every card serve functions outside of their intended combo purposes. Flexibility and efficiency is the primary focus of this deck and so in most cases, popular wincons such as
Laboratory Maniac
are not played since they are dead draws. Most of the win-cons/combo pieces that I chose have utility outside of their combo potential and so are never dead draws. Since this shell is designed to operate independently of the commander, any commander can be run in place of Niv. Underrated commanders like
Jori En, Ruin Diver
can benefit immensely from the flexible and explosive nature of this deck. I try to justify picking Niv because he can act as an alternate win-con since the deck was designed with him at its core, but in truth I picked him mainly because he is a pet card of mine.
WIN-CON:
Every combo will end up with drawing the entire deck into Comet Storm + Inner Fire
COMBOS:
Dream Halls + Enter the Infinite
draws the entire deck. Enter the Infinite, if resolved will always win you the game. Dream halls is one of the narrower cards in the deck, but can allow you to act as a pseudo storm deck as an alternate win-con with Niv to ping the opponents to death as the deck usually has enough draw to go on for a while.
Enter the Infinite + Mizzix's Mastery
Once enter the infinite is in the graveyard, draws the entire deck for 4 mana. You will almost never be casting Mizzix's Mastery's overload cost, however you still have the flexibility of using it in a dire situation to stay alive or when you are completely out of gas (since there will always be draw spells in graveyard).
Dramatic Reversal + Isochron Scepter
generates infinite mana for Comet Storm. Isochron Scepter has the flexibility of being used with the many counterspells and draw spells in the deck if the situation arises. Dramatic reversal will also almost always be a ritual due the the number of mana rocks we run.
Intuition
piles =
Enter the Infinite
,
Mizzix's Mastery
,
Faithless Looting
and
Mystic Retrieval
Intuition can be used when you currently have one of the above mentioned effects, whether in the graveyard or in your hand. In most cases, you will have some way to discard the
Enter the Infinite
and in this case, your pile will be Enter the Infinite + Mizzix's Mastery + Mystic Retrieval
. If you have an
Enter the Infinite
in hand, you will get the previously mentioned pile with
Faithless Looting
in place of
Enter the Infinite
and so on.
Consecrated Sphinx
+ wheels
Thank you for taking a look at my deck and I look forward to hearing feedback and conversations!
Credits: http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/commander-edh/multiplayer-commander-decklists/217112-niv-mizzet-the-firemind-fireminds-fury
Thanks to Rowan for his great primer on Niv-Mizzet, it was a huge influence on my view of the deck and I recommend any Niv fan to take a look.
